HELP! K7s5a pro will not post. And computer will not turn off when i hit the power button.

[JEDI]

just swapped out a p3-1.1ghz to a k7s5a pro/xp2400+ from fry's. it wasn't a returned box.

the k7s5a pro is purple, and is v5.0.

it posted briefly, then the computer turned off. since then i could not get it to post.

the fans are on, but nothing on the screen. i re-seated the agp card. same. replaced the ddr ram w/a single stick of pc-133. same.

hsf is a coolmaster x-dream. i have an enlight 300w power supply.

also, when i turn on the computer, i could not turn it off. when i press the power button on the case, the computer stays on. i had to unplug the power cord. and if i leave it on, it automatically turns off after a couple of minutes.

Any ideas?

 

[Peter]

Did you set the Clear CMOS jumper to Normal? If it worked once, you probably did. Have you mounted the CPU cooling solution PROPERLY, never tried to fire it up even once without? I'm asking because if you did, your CPU is toast now. Your "it worked briefly once and then never again" symptom would be a perfect match for this.

If the processor doesn't boot the board, the chipset should still react to "forced power off" (hold button for five seconds).

 

[JEDI]

why would my computer not respond to the power button?

also, it did post for only 5 sec. i saw the geforce4 spash screen, then to the beginning of the ami bios screen where i saw the cpu listed as a xp1400+, then it cut off. but my chip is a 2400+.

i had the hsf on it. how would i know if it's on properly or not? it's mounted on the hooks on the side

 

[GoingUp]

Originally posted by: JEDI
why would my computer not respond to the power button?

also, it did post for only 5 sec. i saw the geforce4 spash screen, then to the beginning of the ami bios screen where i saw the cpu listed as a xp1400+, then it cut off.

i had the hsf on it. how would i know if it's on properly or not? it's mounted on the hooks on the side

just got one of these boards too, and it arrived DOA. I will be returnin it and gettin a Asus

 

[Peter]

The CPU being identified too slow on first boot is normal. That's because you haven't been to BIOS setup yet. You're supposed to choose the right bus speeds for your CPU and RAM, and before you do, it fires up on slowest possible settings.

My advice still stands - if it lived once for a few seconds, then I'm willing to bet that there is no working CPU cooling in place, which would mean your CPU is toast now. The usual mistakes are heatsink on the wrong way round, no thermally conductive material on the heatsink bottom, forgetting to remove protective foil from said material.
And, fan not plugged into the CPU FAN header. I forgot to say, if the board doesn't detect a spinning CPU fan, it won't fire up either.

 

[Naruto]

Try to make sure the jumpers are in right positions, ECS is sloppy with default factory set jumpers. Its a great board however, my rev 5.0 from frys is running my chip at 2100mhz.

 

[Peter]

As I already said, they're not sloppy about the jumpers, they DELIBERATELY set the CMOS clear jumper on Clear, in order to save on battery life.

 

[JEDI]

Originally posted by: Peter
The CPU being identified too slow on first boot is normal. That's because you haven't been to BIOS setup yet. You're supposed to choose the right bus speeds for your CPU and RAM, and before you do, it fires up on slowest possible settings.

My advice still stands - if it lived once for a few seconds, then I'm willing to bet that there is no working CPU cooling in place, which would mean your CPU is toast now. The usual mistakes are heatsink on the wrong way round, no thermally conductive material on the heatsink bottom, forgetting to remove protective foil from said material.
And, fan not plugged into the CPU FAN header. I forgot to say, if the board doesn't detect a spinning CPU fan, it won't fire up either.

hsf on wrong way?! how does orientation matter?

ah..will check jumper then. it's suppose to be a brand new board, so the jumper should be on clear.

 

[lsman]

if your jumper on clear, you can not even boot/post for the first time. So i doubt the jumper is wrong.

look at the manual. there is a higher level on the socket (ususal say "socket ...") and it should match your HSF (one side with a deeper level.)
if you take the board out of the case without removing the CPU and HSF, you should hold the motherboard and look from side: that the HSF bottom should be level and parallel to the motherboard. An impoper install will be like a slope. if that is the case...... dead CPU as Peter said.

 

[Peter]

Ummm ... if you don't know that heatsinks fit only one way round, then there's a fat chance you got it wrong. You see, the bottom of the heatsink has a step in it, which quite obviously is supposed to be oriented toward the side of the socket that also has a step in it - such that the contact surface actually gets to lie flat on the CPU die.
Also note that if the heatsink has a pad of phase change material on it, and it was on the wrong way round, you've spent your one shot to get it right. You then need to scrape that pad off (WITHOUT making scratches into the quite soft copper material!) and use a THIN layer of thermal grease.

Don't get me wrong ... but given your amount of knowledge, maybe it's time to seek for local help? At least to avoid blasting another CPU?

 

[JEDI]

Originally posted by: Peter
Ummm ... if you don't know that heatsinks fit only one way round, then there's a fat chance you got it wrong. You see, the bottom of the heatsink has a step in it, which quite obviously is supposed to be oriented toward the side of the socket that also has a step in it - such that the contact surface actually gets to lie flat on the CPU die.
Also note that if the heatsink has a pad of phase change material on it, and it was on the wrong way round, you've spent your one shot to get it right. You then need to scrape that pad off (WITHOUT making scratches into the quite soft copper material!) and use a THIN layer of thermal grease.

Don't get me wrong ... but given your amount of knowledge, maybe it's time to seek for local help? At least to avoid blasting another CPU?

step? it looks flat to me? anyway, will check when i get home

 

[JEDI]

arrg..i now see the step, and it was in the wrong place.

looks like i fried it sigh..too bad amd's don't have thermal protection

Anyone know how i can RMA it?

THX

 

[Buz2b]

Not much chance you can RMA a fried processor. They're gonna know it failed due to heat. But, what the heck, you could try I suppose. The "good" news is that the MB is still probably ok. :beer:

 

[dpm]

ah ah heck. The step on heatsinks can catch you out the first time. Easy to forget about, i suppose. Hopefully you've only lost the CPU.

By the way, while AMD cpu's don't have thermal throttling, all of the newer motherboards (nforce2s etc) have thermal protection, that would have saved you from this.

o/t but I didn't realise ECS had released a k7s5a pro - that name still gives me chills. The wierdest thing I had go wrong with mine was with a pci modem - it worked at first, and then randomly started resetting the pc. I couldn't work out what the problem was, and after reinstalling windows (i was using 98, and it had been more than 4 months anyway ) pulling components one by one showed which it was. The funny thing was, the moment I tried to put the modem back in another pci slot the computer started up, and wouldn't turn off without being switched off at the wall socket. I never did work out why it hated that modem so...

 

[Iron Woode]

Originally posted by: JEDI
arrg..i now see the step, and it was in the wrong place.

looks like i fried it sigh..too bad amd's don't have thermal protection

Anyone know how i can RMA it?

THX

Since you have little to lose, why not just put the HSF on correctly and try booting it up?

 

[icjogger]

If the HS is not on correctly...........how far/long will the boot seq go before the CPU is fried. Do you have like 15 - 20 secs??

 

[pspada]

Not very long - once the CPU hits a certain temp it's going to burn out any number of leads within the processor itself, and that's all she wrote.

 

[Peter]

Naked-die processors have practically no surface of their own. 60 to 70 watts on less than a square centimeter means thermal death, fast. You got less than ten seconds at room temperature with no airflow (as is the case when the heatsink is on, but not conductively so).

 

[JEDI]

yup, about 10-15 sec from the only time i saw it post to the computer automatically shutting down

 

[INemtsev]

Had the same thing....reseted bios....worked fine...tada!

 

[gtd2000]

I once installed windows and all other software for a system without the fan being connected on an Athlon 1Ghz system

It is a long story - but using the connection for the fan did not allow the system to boot! I had to exchange the heatsink/fan the next day.

I must have run the CPU with heatsink only for approx 6 hours - no negatives were observed and the same system is still running over 2 years later!

I was advised by AMD Hong Kong that the CPU/System would shut down if the CPU overheated though.....the actual advice was that 50c was an acceptable temperature, 70c was getting warm and 90c was the point it would shut down.

 

[Peter]

Well, there's a world between not having the heatsink on right and having a well conducting heatsink but no fan.

 

[gtd2000]

Originally posted by: Peter
Well, there's a world between not having the heatsink on right and having a well conducting heatsink but no fan.

I agree with you completely, however, there are people out there that think your CPU will be fried in less than a minute if the heatsink fan fails...

 

[Peter]

It all depends on how good the heatsink is, how much case airflow there is, and of course how much power the CPU outputs.
With an Athlon 1000 as in the example above, there is a 70 degree Celsius delta between maximum operating die temperature and ambient air temperature. With a worst case power output of 55 Watts, a generous heatsink, and the airflow brought by the system fan(s), this might very well be survivable.